Last year I joined university. I hadn’t any experience of this life and never heard about that. I had two feelings at that time. Certainly one of them was freedom. A freedom from cramped life of home till intermediate. That is almost similar case except of those who are victim of home sickness. But what is the other feeling which subjugates in every mind as mixture of jitters and fear. Every new comer usually prepares himself to face this blameworthy experience. The experience extracted from the behavior of a senior. Senior in a student society, considered as the esteemed person for an intruder as he is the only who can interact and behave in his own way. Same was the case with me as first year students are considered separate class in very first days of campus life. From campus to hostel journey, the only thing that interfered was senior attitude. I had to meet every senior, giving them respect ignoring the attitude they were showing. It is very tough to control yourself when you are degraded and demotivated just for their amusement. You are asked to do some tasks which are against your nature. First two weeks are the weeks of fooling. This term is very common all around the globe related to campus life. Juniors are just like puppet and senior behave like owners and order them to follow their instruction without considering wrong as wrong. Senior pretend like a reader and junior are books for them. They ask them to be opened from first day to the journey life including their privacies. They are asked to do some vulgar acts that torture physically and mentally. They used to take support of irrelative comments to convince juniors. They used to tell them that they are doing to remove their inner hesitation and to build their confidence. This is pathetic way to themselves just for the sake of levity. This is nothing other than harassment. Some of the juniors are strong enough to deal with these situations but majority spit at the moment the attitude. And this resistance is considered as against the law created by the seniors. Then those juniors are treated in a gaudy manner. After this type of insubordination, they expect to earn respect. After that incident, juniors meet them in a respected but this is a pseudo respect which they consider a sign of proud without knowing the exact intentions that are only based on force and a reason to survive for juniors.
This pressure leads them to the wrong way and they choose that destiny which is full of thorns and they put the mud on the aims of parents. Mostly they waste their talent when they become a part of drug addiction companies of senior who attract these immature boys. Moreover, in the government universities especially of Pakistan, still youth are separated on the basis of caste and region. As I belong to Saraiki region, so I was offered to join the Saraiki council. The seniors who invited me were giving a reasons that it will help me in every problem related to my study or any other problem but I found most of them just wasting their time and they were involved in fighting with other councils that were also established for the same purpose. As majority of newcomers are unaware about the purpose of these societies and councils, so they join freely and face the consequences in their degree. Due to this alarming situation, I found vacant seats in co-curricular society meetings. I found irrelevant people working on the designations that they do not deserve. This factor is just because the talent is not utilized according to the assets.
There is another view of senior side which should be presented as they deserve the title of SENIOR in a true manner. I found many of them just bucking up and motivating all the time. They earn respect and only they invest in affectionate behavior and words because words have worth to touch the feelings of a person. These seniors never show any attitude to their juniors, they never let their juniors feel that no one is there to support them. They help them in study, they help them in their other issues. They are the real courage for juniors to participate in positive activities and groom them. They never interfere their personal life just for joy. Even when the juniors complete their degree, they become a source of employment too in the form of links. They not only treat as friend but they are like a family whom we can share each and everything in a tension free environment. They are mentors. They let you know how to grab your destiny in your hands. They help in developing the skills to live with dignity.
Good and bad remains together everywhere. It depends on an individual to differentiate between them. Seniors who degrade the juniors in any form must be demotivated and there should be strict laws in government institutes against ragging. In last 7 years, 31 cases of suicide were reported in India as the ratio is much higher in these South Asian countries including Pakistan, India, China and Bangladesh. It is a duty of a senior to present himself like a senior rather than showing as a filthy mind. They must be a light for their junior rather than becoming a darkness and considering it as a question of their ego. They should develop a positive and firm attitude and there should be no compromise over the self-dignity and freedom of way to live.